Book review: Birds of Paradise Lost, by Andrew Lam

by Andrew Lam

Red Hen Press

Birds of Paradise Lost, the first collection of short stories from Vietnamese-American writer Andrew Lam, is frustrating. Which is not to say it's not enjoyable - Lam has a sense of plot and pacing that is as important as it is rare in short story writing. The stories here manage to surprise and each is artfully structured; they seem measured down to the word to leave the reader satisfied, never fatigued or left hanging.

Often Lam's stories are genuinely and uniquely moving. He almost always avoids the obvious solutions, the sentimentality looming around every corner and instead presents a series of characters damaged and haunted in their own intensely personal ways.

Lam's characters are without exception flawed, sometimes completely broken, but their identities and actions, while sometimes inexplicable, ring true.